Mystery: Old glass diapostives

IanB

For readers of this thread, I made a blooper before, this is what I wanted to post!
The two pics above are of some old glass-plate diapositives found amongst some garbage. They seem to have been taken by a traveller in Africa some time during the 1st quarter of the 20th century. Research on their origins has been slow.
The full set of digitized photos is posted on my Smugmug site: link:
http://39-steps.smugmug.com/gallery/6790462_2GoJD/1/433880994_BLwBZ

They are there temporarily, i can't really claim they are mine, I just digitized them. The slides are glass plate photosmade up of a 'sandwich' of two 1mm plates, the back one carrying the emulsion image. I'd like to ask if anyone out there knows about this technique, and what is the best way to copy them? They won't fit in my Canon 4200F scanner, as they are about 82mm square. These images have been photographed on an old light-box with my handheld Fuji S3500, on 2M (?) quality. I tried to scan them with the light-box inverted over the platen, but the images came out with what I assume to be interference lines: see the image of two photos near the end. The pics are remarkably sharp, but the color not too good, possibly because I'm using fluorescent light? Some I have enhanced using Arcsoft Photostudio Auto-enhance. I thought photgraph them agin, using a Nikon D40 on a tripod, at 'Fine' res. Any comment or discussion would be welcome.:dunno Ciao.

aj986s

Very cool find! Hope you can find out more about their history. Any information about the source of the "garbage"?

As far as copying them, I am no expert, but recently started experimenting with copying some old 35mm negatives of my own. Some of your pictures on your website remind me of the off-cast (yellow) result I initially got, probably due to improper backlighting.

I first tried copying using a lens mounted Bower holder, and discovered that light source can be very problematic. I had used the halogen desk lamp thru the frosted lens of the Bower adapter. Copy of negative was well detailed, but colors were all off. I tried to compensate in PS, but tuff to get it right. I subsequently copied on my scanner; slow process but results were very good. I want to reshoot with the camera using daylight or flash backlighting, to see if I get better colors.

IanB

aj986s wrote:

Very cool find! Hope you can find out more about their history. Any information about the source of the "garbage"?

As far as copying them, I am no expert, but recently started experimenting with copying some old 35mm negatives of my own. Some of your pictures on your website remind me of the off-cast (yellow) result I initially got, probably due to improper backlighting.

I first tried copying using a lens mounted Bower holder, and discovered that light source can be very problematic. I had used the halogen desk lamp thru the frosted lens of the Bower adapter. Copy of negative was well detailed, but colors were all off. I tried to compensate in PS, but tuff to get it right. I subsequently copied on my scanner; slow process but results were very good. I want to reshoot with the camera using daylight or flash backlighting, to see if I get better colors.

Thanks for the tip about daylight backlighting; I can make up a mask and set it up in front of a window that is brightly illuminated, without the sun shining direct into the camera.
The slides were found among the stuff discarded from a deceased widow's apartment, In Pietermaritzburg, S Africa; they may have belonged to her husband, late John Wright, who we understand was in the Parachute Regiment (British) in WW2. The other source may have been thru her father, one Tim (or Syd?) O'Callaghan; I've reached a dead-end there. I'm afraid this project has been dormant, as i've been abroad quite lot this year so it's rather on the back-burner at present. Ciao.

davidweaver

You might want to send a note to Imperial War Museum in London (http://www.iwm.org.uk/) as you have information about the possible photographer.

Cheers,
David

IanB wrote:

Thanks for the tip about daylight backlighting; I can make up a mask and set it up in front of a window that is brightly illuminated, without the sun shining direct into the camera.
The slides were found among the stuff discarded from a deceased widow's apartment, In Pietermaritzburg, S Africa; they may have belonged to her husband, late John Wright, who we understand was in the Parachute Regiment (British) in WW2. The other source may have been thru her father, one Tim (or Syd?) O'Callaghan; I've reached a dead-end there. I'm afraid this project has been dormant, as i've been abroad quite lot this year so it's rather on the back-burner at present. Ciao.

IanB

davidweaver wrote:

You might want to send a note to Imperial War Museum in London (http://www.iwm.org.uk/) as you have information about the possible photographer.

Cheers,
David

Thanks, I will follow that up. We had thought of finally sending them to the Pitt-Rivers Collection at Oxford University Museum: they have better facilities for cleaning, research, etc.

dreamcometrue

wow
Those pictures are amazing. What a lucky find. Good luck with finding out more history on the images. It is amazing how far photography has come. It makes you apriciate the time and effort put into pictures so long ago.

Skippy

IanB wrote:

For readers of this thread, I made a blooper before, this is what I wanted to post!

The two pics above are of some old glass-plate diapositives found amongst some garbage. They seem to have been taken by a traveller in Africa some time during the 1st quarter of the 20th century. Research on their origins has been slow.
The full set of digitized photos is posted on my Smugmug site: link:
http://39-steps.smugmug.com/gallery/6790462_2GoJD/1/433880994_BLwBZ

They are there temporarily, i can't really claim they are mine, I just digitized them. The slides are glass plate photosmade up of a 'sandwich' of two 1mm plates, the back one carrying the emulsion image. I'd like to ask if anyone out there knows about this technique, and what is the best way to copy them? They won't fit in my Canon 4200F scanner, as they are about 82mm square. These images have been photographed on an old light-box with my handheld Fuji S3500, on 2M (?) quality. I tried to scan them with the light-box inverted over the platen, but the images came out with what I assume to be interference lines: see the image of two photos near the end. The pics are remarkably sharp, but the color not too good, possibly because I'm using fluorescent light? Some I have enhanced using Arcsoft Photostudio Auto-enhance. I thought photgraph them agin, using a Nikon D40 on a tripod, at 'Fine' res. Any comment or discussion would be welcome. Ciao.

Ian what a wonderful find
I remember many years ago attending a night at a Camera Club in Geelong,
someone there had some old glass slides too.

I hope you are able to find more information about the origin of these,
and wish you luck as you seek to discover the story behind them.

All the best, and thank you for showing us your Historical Find
... Skippy
.